


like I just lost the world war

by Solshine



Category: Genghis Khan - Miike Snow (Music Video)
Genre: Character Death, Heavy Angst, M/M, shameless histrionics
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-16
Updated: 2016-02-16
Packaged: 2018-05-20 23:10:52
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,574
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6028891
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Solshine/pseuds/Solshine
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's easier than it should be to forget that the man he married is a supervillain. As someone is trying to remind him, life is made of choices--just not all of them belong to you.</p>
            </blockquote>





	like I just lost the world war

**Author's Note:**

> Welp. I apologize for this. Blame Elarkay, who requested this, not me. If I write more angst fics I'll put them here so they don't contaminate my fluff. 
> 
> (Also if you have a request for a GK fic, I'm riding this insane fandom train all the way to the terminal so hmu)

It isn't as though he’d hidden anything. Bradley had spent a night strapped under a gigantic killer laser before they started dating; suffice it to say he definitely knew Dominik was a supervillain. But once he was in love it just… seemed less important. Life is choices. Bradley retired quietly rather than risk having to fight Dominik, so they stopped meeting professionally. And they didn't talk about work on dates, certainly not at home with Dominik’s kids. 

It was a surprisingly easy thing to forget, was all.

Bradley didn't move in until after they were finally married. It was some combination of a consideration of boundaries for the kids, and some unspoken superstition, he thought. Like their unlikely love story, so uniquely precarious, had to be locked into place before they dared be too happy. ‘Hah, we’re a family now, no take backsies!’

If only it were so simple.

He doesn't see the stain on the uniform shirt at first, thanks to its dark color, but the undershirt is hard to miss: a great rust-colored blotch stark against the white fabric. Bradley's heart stops for a second--illogically, since Dominik was obviously well enough today to come home and toss his shirt in the hamper. He goes in search of his husband anyway.

“Dom!” Bradley exclaims when he finds him in their bedroom. Dominik looks up from bootbrushing his shoes.

“Hmm?”

Bradley holds up the undershirt. “What is this? Are you okay?” 

Dominik gets up and puts his shoes on the floor by the closet. “Don't worry,” he says, pecking a kiss on Bradley's shoulder as he passes. “It isn't mine.”

For a few confusing moments too long Bradley thinks he means the undershirt isn't his.

Dominik smiles at him and goes to check on the casserole, and Bradley remains in the bedroom, standing still and feeling suddenly uneasy.

\---

Usually, it's so normal. It makes it easy to throw the undershirt away and dunk the uniform in hydrogen peroxide and not think about it. 

Dominik comes home one night and hangs up his coat humming some little tune. Bradley looks up from the bills he’s doing at the kitchen table and smiles. “You're in a good mood.”

As answer Dominik only comes over, leans down, and plants a kiss soundly on his husband. When they part Bradley is smiling even wider.

“Started dinner yet?”

Bradley looks at his watch. “Sorry, not yet. You're home early.”

“Good day at work. Hey guys!” he says as the kids come running out of their rooms. Lizzie gets to him first, and he picks her up and swings her around as she shrieks with giggles. “How do pancakes for dinner sound?”

The kids cheer and Bradley laughs. Dominik puts Lizzie down and throws on a cooking apron. It's times like this Bradley feels most grateful for everything that led him here, no matter the difficulties, no matter how impossible it seemed, no matter his compunctions. This man is a good husband and a good father and isn't that what matters?

He puts the stained shirt far from his mind.

\---

The next morning, after Dominik leaves for work, Bradley goes out to pick up the morning paper. There's something circled in red on the bottom of the front page--a story about some government building being bombed yesterday. 

Written next to the article is a note, in elegant handwriting he doesn't recognize. Just one phrase. _Good day at work._

He stands there on the front stoop, in Dom’s bathrobe and his untouched coffee in his hand, for almost a full minute, staring at the note and the article, before its meaning registers.

He looks up quickly, as though whoever left it would have remained waiting behind a bush for his reaction. There's no one, of course.

He has a fleeting thought that the note sender could be lying, or wrong. There's nothing in the article that ties it with Dominik. But there's also no reason he has to believe otherwise, except that Bradley wants it to not be so. His eyes skip unwillingly over numbers of missing and dead and he thinks about pancakes and kisses and he knows the note is telling the truth. 

He already knew this, Bradley tells himself. He already knew this, it’s not a surprise. He's stopped Dom himself from blowing up a building before. 

But he wasn't Dom then, was he?

_A good day at work._

Bradley throws the paper away without reading the rest of it. He doesn't mention it to Dominik.

\---

A couple of weeks later, as he’s putting groceries away, the phone rings. Bradley shuts the refrigerator and goes to answer it.

“Hello?”

There is a faint distant buzz on the line that brings to mind his old life of surveillance wires and bugs. “We got the passwords you requested, sir,” comes a voice.

“Ah, thank you.” This one is Dominik’s voice. “I’ll test them to make sure our guest was honest with us, and then you can attend to cleanup.”

“You wouldn't like to do it yourself, sir?”

“The passwords will keep me busy enough. No frills, just dispose of him.”

Him…? Him. The ‘guest’ they’d gotten the passwords off of. An agent, probably. “Dominik?” Bradley says, knowing Dom can't hear him. “Who is this?” he demands. “Who's doing this, who's calling?”

There's a click, and then a dial tone.

\---

He doesn't speak much at dinner. He knows Dominik notices, but he waits to ask until kids and dads are set to the tasks of homework and dishes, respectively.

“Hey,” says Dominik quietly, taking his station at the sink with a teatowel in hand. “What's the matter?”

Bradley doesn't know how to say “I temporarily forgot you killed people,” so he just smiles weakly. “It's nothing,” he says, handing over a plate for drying. “Just a headache.”

Dominik hums sympathetically and strokes Bradley's hand with a thumb as he accepts the plate. They work in silence for a minute before Bradley speaks again.

“So have you met my replacement yet?” he says as casually as he can. Dom sends him a quizzical look. “Another agent,” Bradley clarifies.

Dominik smiles. “A few,” he says. Bradley's stomach clenches. “But then nobody can replace you,” he adds, winking.

“What happened to them?” Bradley blurts. Dominik frowns and Bradley loses his nerve. He tries to grin. “I mean, have they foiled any of your schemes or do I have to be embarrassed for my agency?”

“Once or twice,” he chuckles. “It turns out though that my not being in love with any of them is a distinct tactical advantage.” There must be something in Bradley's face, because Dominik reaches over and runs a hand over his shoulder comfortingly. "Did you take an aspirin?"

"Yeah. I should be fine soon." He hands Dominik the last plate without meeting his eyes. "I think I'll turn in early, though."

Dom frowns like he knows there's something Bradley's not saying, but if he does notice something's off, he doesn't mention it. "Okay," is all he says. "Feel better, love."

Bradley goes to bed, but doesn't turn out the lights right away. He sits up and stares at the coverlet, lost in thought. What can he possibly say? "I know we had this discussion a long time ago and I said I was fine with it, but I changed my mind. I do want you to give up your career, just to make me feel better." He already chose this, that he wanted this, life is choices, and he chose Dom. And he does want Dom--he just doesn't want Dr. Vergoldetschnauz. Somewhere in the process he's forgotten they're the same person.

The bedroom door opens and Bradley looks up. It's Dom with a mug in his hand and a tentative smile.

"I figured, if you had a headache, maybe not a martini..."

Bradley's chest tightens with love. "Thank you," he says. Dom sits down on the edge of the bed, next to Bradley's legs, and hands the mug to him. Bradley watches as Dom folds his hands in his lap and stares at them for a few moments.

Finally Dominik speaks. "If there's something wrong," he says slowly, still looking at his hands. "I hope you'd tell me." Bradley licks his lips and wraps his hands around the mug. Dominik looks up at him. "Barbara and I, we never talked. About important things. And I knew something was wrong, but I didn't ask because I didn't want to know. I mean," he adds, looking back down at his hands, "maybe I'm overreacting--"

Bradley reaches out and lays a hand over Dom's. "It's okay," he says, and Dom looks up again. "I... you're right, something's bothering me, but... I think I need to deal with some of it myself, first."

Dominik chews on the inside of his cheek. "Dealing with things together is kind of why we got married." 

"You haven't done anything..." Anything wrong? Anything to upset him? "To me," he finishes. "I love you. I just need to think about some things. I promise I'll tell you as soon as I'm done."

Dominik sighs. "I'm so happy," he says, though he sounds more wistful. "Sometimes this doesn't feel like something that I... get to have. Like I'm just waiting for the other shoe to drop."

Bradley squeezes his hand. "We'll be fine," he says, and hopes it's the truth. 

\---

The next morning, Bradley takes the kids to school. He drops them off and they bid him goodbye with "Bye Papa!" and he catches his breath to hear it, just like always. He wonders when he'll ever be used to it, having these amazing kids be his. He feels woefully underequipped; he's glad Dom is so good with them.

A black car pulls up next to his at the stoplight, but he doesn't pay attention. It is an indication of how far he's let his training slide that he doesn't notice the other black car join him on his other side a moment later. It isn't until the black van halts in the intersection just in front of him, boxing him in, that he realizes what is happening.

Black-suited goons swarm out of the vehicles. Bradley throws his car into reverse, but it's too late; he's being dragged from his car and thrown in the back of the van, handcuffed and a bag over his head, before he can do a thing.

He can't stop thinking about Alex and Lizzie wondering why he won't be there to pick them up from school.

\---

When he is thrown into a chair and the bag is pulled off his head, he finds himself in a pretty standard issue bare concrete room. He sits before a woman in a black tactical suit, her hard eyes ringed with eyeliner.

“Hello, Mr. Ellington,” she says. “Or, wait, I can't remember. Is it Vergoldetschnauz-Ellington these days? Goodness, that's a bit of a mouthful, isn't it?”

Bradley's thrown off balance by her familiar tone, and then further off balance when he looks closer and figures out who she is. He is torn between protocol for confronting a supervillain and for meeting his husband’s ex-wife.

“Oh,” he says lamely. “Sorry, I didn't, uh, recognize you. You... look different.” Barbara just smiles in response, thinly and unamused. “What do you want?” he adds, trying to regain some ground.

“Just a chat,” she says, joining her hands behind her back. “You’ve gotten my little messages?”

“You know I did,” he says. “What are they supposed to accomplish?” 

“Exactly what they have accomplished,” she says, the corner of her lip curling up. “I’ve just been reminding you of what I figured you might have forgotten.” Bradley presses his lips together, says nothing. Barbara takes a step forward, bends over a bit at the waist so her face is closer. “You know,” she says, “if there's anyone you can talk to about this, it's me. I did his laundry too, once.”

“Forgive me if the handcuffs don't put me in a chatty mood,” he grits out.

She straightens and sighs down at him. “Yes,” she says. “Sorry about that. An unfortunate necessity, you know, especially when Dom shows up.” Dominik is coming? Bradley is filled with a sick dread. It's a trap. “He should be here before too long, but we haven't had a proper talk yet. I do understand what you're going through, Bradley.”

He tries to fiddle covertly with the cuffs as she turns and begins stalking slowly back and forth before his chair. “But then,” she continues, “I suppose that's not entirely true. Because I supported him. I washed strangers’ blood out of his clothes and was glad because it wasn't his. I didn't turn on the news and have some pathetic moral crisis.” She sneers. "Everyone knows this is why you don't mix your work life with your love life. There's no separation of interest. You quit, of course, but it was too late. You cared about the work, about civilians and justice and averting disaster and things like that, before you ever cared about him.”

"Sounds like you have me pegged," Bradley says as calmly as he can.

"I do," she spits. "You know you're going to have to choose, but you haven't got the spine to do it!”

“Barbara?” comes an incredulous voice behind him. “What is this?”

“Dominik, it's a trap, look out!” Bradley calls, twisting around to catch sight of him in the shadows of the dim room.

“Obviously it's a trap,” says Dominik, sounding annoyed as he approaches them in the center of the room. “Barb, what the fuck are you doing with my husband?”

“Just arranging a little couples therapy session for you,” she says, smiling brightly. “I'm so glad you're finally here. You two really need to have a serious talk.”

Despite the urgency of the situation, Dominik’s eyes drag over to Bradley.

“It's nothing,” says Bradley. “Barbara, please let us go.” There's a touch of uncertainty in Dominik's face, and Bradley swallows. He doesn't like putting on a show for Dominik's violently unstable ex, but he can't help the words coming out.

“I'm happy too,” he says. “I'm… You said you were waiting for something to go wrong, but I was… I've been just the opposite. I wasn't expecting to still have to work for this. It was so hard to get here, and I thought we'd…earned it?” His tone is a little bit pleading. “I forgot we earned happy, not normal.” He licks his lips. “It's nothing. I… I forgot, a little bit. What you did for a living.”

Dominik takes a breath. “Oh,” he says.

“It’s fine,” Bradley says hurriedly. “You love me, I know that, and you love Alex and Lizzie. And you're trying to accomplish something out there. I get that, in a way. It's your work. My hands aren't clean either.”

Dominik's eyes are warming, but they're interrupted by laughter from Barbara. “Yes,” she says, sounding like she thinks it's very funny. “All in the line of work. Very reasonable.” She comes over and leans down, resting her hands on Bradley's knees. “Coming up with a way to justify it doesn't count as choosing,” she whispers.

“Get your hands off of him,” Dominik growls.

Barbara lifts an eyebrow, unimpressed, and stands back up. “Yes, well. That brings us to the feature presentation.” She reaches to a holster on her thigh and pulls out a gun. 

Bradley's mind starts humming with neglected training, and Dominik stiffens next to him and the kids, oh god, if she shoots him then Dominik will be so sad, and the kids won't understand, he's not going to get to say goodbye to them--

A henchman all in black walks out of the darkness and places a small box in her other hand.

Behind her, a television screen he hadn't noticed flicks silently on. It shows a busy highway bridge that Bradley recognizes as being just on the edge of the city. He has no idea where she's going with this.

“Dominik, my darling,” she says with a cold smile. “I’ll keep this quite simple. There is a bomb attached to that bridge that is activated by this button,” she explains, holding the little box up in illustration. “Either I can press the button, or I can kill your husband. No tricks, just a choice.” 

Bradley looks over at Dominik. He's watching her with narrowed eyes.

“No tricks,” she says again. “We were married for eight years, Dom. You know you can take me at my word. I just want you to choose one.”

Bradley is braced for a drawn-out standoff. What he's not expecting is for Dominik to move toward Barbara with two long strides and snatch the box from her hand. Bradley's breath stops, but she doesn't fight him, no minion jumps out to stop him. She doesn't even flinch.

Dominik presses the button. The screen lights up mutely a moment later with golden explosions.

Barbara nods to the shadows and a henchman steps out and releases Bradley's handcuffs.

Dominik puts the box back in Barbara’s hand, then turns on his heel and marches away again. He reaches out to take Bradley's hand as he passes. “Come on.”

Bradley jerks his hand away. He sees out of the corner of his eye Dom looking shocked; Bradley, for his part, has his eyes glued to the screen. He rises from the chair and stands there, transfixed.

The explosions have cleared, leaving the chaos visible through the smoke. He can see cars still falling from the bridge, cars burning, pieces of concrete and rebar dangling like frayed threads from a ripped garment.

“Bradley?” says Dominik.

“You just killed… dozens of people,” Bradley says dazedly, as though Dom doesn't know. “Innocent people, they had nothing to do with us.” Dominik just looks confused.

“Was I supposed to let you die?” he says.

“You were supposed to…” He swallows. “To… to hesitate! Something!”

Dominik shakes his head. “I will never hesitate.” He looks very sad, very tired suddenly. “I'm sorry, darling. I didn't realize you’d…” He sighs. He makes a small movement like he wants to reach out for Bradley's hand again, but doesn't. 

“It's like you said,” he tells him. “I love you. You and the kids. I’ll always choose you, over everything else. I don't know if I'm a good person. Probably not. But I try to be good to you, and to them. I don't really care about being anything else.” His eyes beg for understanding. “I'm sorry. I get it if that's not enough.”

Bradley looks at him and… Shit. He fell in love cuffed to chairs and tied to tables and strapped to gurneys. This is nothing new. He can walk away right now if he wants, try to fall in love again with a good man who would never kill for him, would never make him pick love against innocent lives, for whom he would never have to wash a stranger’s blood out of his shirts. He can, but he can't imagine doing it.

“Of course it’s enough,” he says around a lump in his throat. If it's all in or fold, he's all in. Fuck the Right Thing. He reaches out and takes both of Dom’s hands in his. “I love you. I choose you. It’s enough.”

The smile he gets in response to that, slow and warm and awed, makes it all worth it.

From next to the television screen, Barbara sighs. “Well,” she says, “I tried.”

She lifts her handgun and fires, and the smile disappears. The body crumples to the ground.

Bradley makes a stumbling effort to catch Dom as he falls, before he really understands what has happened. He ends up on the ground too, an awkward armful of heavy body and limp limbs. Dominik's dark uniform shirt is splattered with blood, he notices dimly. Again.

“My men will take you back to your car,” says Barbara.

Bradley clutches the body and turns his eyes slowly, incredulously up to her. He still does not quite understand, his mind is foggy and slow, but his shirt is growing damp from the head cradled against it and he knows that he is not an agent anymore but he is still dangerous, he could… He should…

“Best not,” says Barbara. She puts her gun back in its holster and meets his eyes. Her expression is grave, and there is a speck in it of something more human that he is expecting. “The kids need you.”

She's right. He looks down numbly at Dominik's blank face, and he thinks about all the things he could do before her goons got a shot in. He thinks about Alex and Lizzie waiting alone at the school as the hours pass and the sun goes down, wondering… and he chooses not to.

The men help him carry Dominik out to the vehicle waiting to take him back to his abandoned car. He chooses to call his old agency when he gets there. They're surprised to hear from him, to say the least, but they agree to come pick the body up and clear the legal issues.

He chooses to drive home. He chooses to take a shower. He chooses to throw away the shirt he was wearing. Later he will choose to pick the kids up from school, choose to make them dinner.

Life is choices.


End file.
